1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a printer for a plurality of different printing objects which can include documents, checks, savings booklets, protocols, forms of all kinds such as, for example, bills, receipts, driver licenses, passports, identification cards, motor vehicle documents, both picture BTX texts (hardcopy) as well as teletex TTX texts.
2. Brief Description of the Background of the Invention Including Prior Art
Such printing objects, which can be processed by conventional printing machines, comprise numerous purposes and include receipt slips produced by roller strips. Such printers are employed in banks, financial institutions, post offices, municipal administrations, and governmental authorities and offices of all kinds, in commercial enterprises, in cooperatives, and in general commercial activities.
Such multifunctional printers are subject to big problems with respect to their economic production, Printers for individual functions are known. For example, savingsbooklet printers are produced which are naturally deemed to be a specialty printer. In addition, there exist ticket printers, which are also considered specialty printers. It is understood that a printer with several functions becomes less favorable in production and economics the higher the number of functions increases. Difficulties occur in case of multifunctional printers in addition by the special form of the objects to be printed on, since there exist large varieties with regard to thickness, stiffness, quality, and irregularity of cut, in case of savings booklets, driver licenses, passports, identification cards, and motor vehicle documents, which impose limits in the processing.
On the other hand, the market not always requires the highest number of functions such that the selection of functions has to be performed already in the planning of the production in the production plant. Thus, the problem of the multifunctional printer is substantially a problem of the construction and of the production economy.
It is known from German Patent No. 3,208,111 to provide a printing device of modular construction, where the printer apparatus can be tilted around a hinge between one position where an individual form or, respectively, a set of forms is being printed on, and one position where an endless form or, respectively, a set of endless forms is being printed on. It is known in this context to form the individual-form transport modular as a removable base apparatus and it is further known to form the printer apparatus and the endless-form transport in a foldable way. Such a construction, however, does not resolve the problem to provide to the printer a larger number of functions, which are taken into consideration already at the time of construction and production planning and not only during the use of the printer.